New Delhi, September 01 2009: With a vast panorama of Indian and foreign books on a wide range of subjects including fiction, non-fiction, academic and technical books, text books, reference books, classics, dictionaries, encyclopedias, children's books and religious literature; the nine-day mega event of the 15th Delhi Book Fair which kicked off on August 29 at Pragati Maidan here provided an opportunity to the students, teachers, scholars, authors, intellectuals, librarians and book lovers who waited for all the year round to make their ways to the stalls and get the books of their choice.

The fair was inaugurated by the Union Minister of State for Corporate affairs and Minority Affairs at the auditorium of the Hall No 8 of Pragati Maidan.

Organised by the Indian Trade Promotion Organisation in association with the Federation of Indian Publishers, the fair had 230 publishers with oversea participants from Abu Dhabi, China, Iran, Pakistan and USA.

Apart from book stalls; a number of seminars, book launches, buyer-seller meets and meet the author programmes were scheduled during the fair.

This year, the theme of the fair has been chosen to be 'Literature from the North East' which will be a golden opportunity for the talented writers from the North East Region of the country to expose their literary works in the national capital.

The auditorium which had been reserved for daily events of seminars, panel discussions and book launches was well decorated with large wall-hangings depicting the photographs and short bio-data of 27 eminent litterateurs of the North East States- one from Arunachal Pradesh, four from Assam, three each from Meghalaya and Mizoram, four from Nagaland, two from Sikkim and 10 from Tripura.

Books from the North East States were also specifically displayed at the area.

A lone book stall of Tripura Publishers Guild remained as representative of the whole North East Region.

Twenty seven literary figures displayed in the Delhi Book Fair were Mamang Dai from Arunachal Pradesh; Indira Goswami, Mitra Phukan, Shila Purkayastha and Imran Hussain from Assam; Streamlet Dkher, Sylvanus Lamare and Jenniefer Dkher from Meghalaya; Lalthongfal A.Sailo, Laltluangliana Khiangle and V.R.Ralte from Mizoram; Welshokhroto Lasub, Duovituo Kholie, Easterine Iralu and Temsula Ao from Nagaland; Shankar Deo Dhakal and Sanu Lama from Sikkim; and Chandrakanta Murashing, Aparajita Roy, Nirmal Das , Niranjan Chakma, Dr.Brajagopal Roy, Ratul Debbarman, Debabrata Deb, Kumud Kunda Chowdhury, Anil Sarkar and Shyamlal Debbarma from Tripura.

Manipur missed to expose its literary figures as well as its specialties of literature in the fair, even though Manipuri language had been one of the recognized Indian languages and the State had so far produced 34 Sahitya Akademi Awardees.

Subhabrata Deb, Secretary of Tripura Publishers Guild was not happy with the arrangement that had created very poor participation of the delegates and officials from the North East States.

He said that the Seminar on Publication Scenario of North East States � Past and Present which was scheduled on Monday from 10 am to 1.30 pm at the venue was cancelled due to non- availability of resource persons and delegates.

He further asserted, "The theme of the fair is 'Literature from the North East'.

We miss a rare chance which we would have to expose ourselves in the fair being held in the national capital".

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